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An Australian business owner has “taken matters into her own hands” after catching a customer trying to steal hundreds of dollars’ worth of clothing using a common credit card scam.
Marisa Taschke, 37, told news.com.au a fraudster attempted to take $315 worth of items from her brand, The Lullaby Club, using a tactic known as a “chargeback” scam.
This occurs when a buyer falsely disputes a legitimate purchase with their bank or card provider to get their money back while still keeping the product or service.
“Most of the time I don’t even bother submitting evidence to the shopping platform because, no matter how much proof you provide, you almost never win,” Taschke told news.com.au.
“But this time I’d just had enough.
“It had already been a bit of a week for me, and I just thought, not today, Satan,” she explained.
Taschke runs The Lullaby Club, a fashion label she started with her mother.
The brand, which boasts more than 220K followers on Instagram, focuses on relaxed, functional pieces created after she struggled to find clothing that was both comfortable and stylish during pregnancy and early motherhood.
Determined to fight back, the hard working, small-business owner decided to investigate the order herself.
After Googling the shipping address linked to the purchase, she discovered the parcel had been delivered to the customer’s workplace.
So Taschke called her work directly and explained that a fraudulent order had been delivered there.
She was then put through to the customer, who was left “shocked” to be confronted about the alleged theft while sitting at her desk.
“I told her that if it wasn’t sorted out today we would have to take it further, as a chargeback where someone keeps the items is essentially theft,” Taschke said.
“I said look, if you don’t sort this out today, I’m gonna have to get the police to your workplace and that could be quite embarrassing”.
About ten minutes later, the customer called back crying.
“She said it was her dad’s card, that it had been an accident and she couldn’t cancel the chargeback but would pay for the order,” Taschke said.
Taschke sent an invoice for the $315 order plus the $17.50 penalty fee her business had incurred, which the customer promptly paid.
Far from over
The story could have ended there, but Taschke quickly realized the scammer had done the same thing before.
Taschke was discussing the frustrations of chargebacks with a friend who owns another clothing label, Fayt The Label.
“Somehow the story came up and we realized the same girl had actually done the exact same thing to her brand in 2023 for around $175,” Taschke revealed.
“So it turns out it wasn’t her dad’s card and it wasn’t an accident,” she said.
“It was just the best story she could come up with once she’d been caught.”
Taschke claimed the customer’s crying was just a “crocodile tears” act.
Following a now viral video exposing the incident, the customer actually reached out to Taschke directly, admitting she had lied about the card and confessing.
“She said she had ‘changed,’ but the reality was she had only just done the chargeback to us the Thursday before, so it was hard to take that seriously,” Taschke said.
In a direct message to the scammer via her TikTok, Taschke delivered a stern warning.
“If you’re seeing this, we know what you’re doing. It’s disgusting. And yeah, you f—ked with the wrong person today,” she said.
Small scams, big impact
Taschke believes this type of fraud is on the rise, noting she has been flooded with messages from other business owners who have experienced similar scams, some involving orders over $700.
“Someone even told me they’ve seen people try to charge back things like rent or holidays they’ve physically already been on, which is honestly wild,” she said.
The business owner said the chargeback incident highlights a broader issue with how banks handle fraud claims.
“At the moment the system is very heavily weighted toward the customer, which makes it quite easy for people to take advantage,” she explained.
Most importantly, she wants consumers to remember the human cost of these scams.
“There are real people behind small businesses,” Taschke said.
“When something like this happens, it’s not just a faceless company absorbing the loss, it directly affects the people running it.”
Read the full article here
